Professional Exploration: Declaration of Intent

Yuchen Tong 10/13/18

Topic: Childhood obesity

Personal Statement of Interest

My interest in childhood obesity started from my college first-year writing session, when we discussed childhood obesity as a the topic for the whole semester. I realize that childhood obesity is a very complex problem that has deep social roots, and it brings severe negative consequences for both individuals and society. There are many national wise, community-based, school-based and family-based interventions have been implemented to help solve this problem by changing child behaviors in macro scope. But few innovative products are designed to help this situation. A very large percentage of overweight children comes from low-income families, and they have very limited access to professional assistance. So they really need a fun way to prevent them from obesity. Also, I am currently working with a community partner BAWSI, who provides underprivileged children with access to sport activities, to improve their beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors about physical activity. I believe these two projects can be well related.

Book List

1. Kraak, Vivica A., Catharyn T. Liverman, and Jeffrey P. Koplan, eds. Preventing childhood obesity: health in the balance. National Academies Press, 2005.

2. Manzini, Ezio. Design, when everybody designs: An introduction to design for social innovation. MIT press, 2015.

3. Design for the Other 90%. Cooper-Hewitt Museum of, 2007.

4. De Vaus, David A., and David de Vaus. Research design in social research. Sage, 2001.

Article List

1. Kumanyika, Shiriki, and Sonya Grier. "Targeting interventions for ethnic minority and low-income populations." The Future of Children (2006): 187-207, https://www.jstor.org/stable/3556556?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents

2. Burdette, Hillary L., and Robert C. Whitaker. "Neighborhood playgrounds, fast food restaurants, and crime: relationships to overweight in low-income preschool children." Preventive medicine 38.1 (2004): 57-63, https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0091743503002330

3. Finegood, Diane T., Thomas DN Merth, and Harry Rutter. "Implications of the foresight obesity system map for solutions to childhood obesity." Obesity 18.S1 (2010): S13-S16, https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1038/oby.2009.426

4. Maziak, W. , Ward, K. D. and Stockton, M. B. (2008), Childhood obesity: are we missing the big picture?. Obesity Reviews, 9: 35-42. doi:10.1111/j.1467-789X.2007.00376.x

5. Wan TTH (2017) Communitybased Preventive Interventions for Childhood Obesity: Design Strategies for Implementing a Population Health Management Program. J Hosp Med Manage Vol.3 No.2:19, http://hospital-medical-management.imedpub.com/communitybased-preventive-interventionsfor-childhood-obesity-design-strategiesfor-implementing-a-population-healthmanagement-progr.php?aid=20684

6. Tanya Covic, Louise Roufeil, Suzanne Dziurawiec; Community beliefs about childhood obesity: its causes, consequences and potential solutions, Journal of Public Health, Volume 29, Issue 2, 1 June 2007, Pages 123–131, https://doi.org/10.1093/pubmed/fdm023

Thinkers to Follow

1. Martina Cartwright Ph.D., R.D. Science educator, Scientist, Clinician, Compliance expert, Researcher and Author.

2. Julie Zhuo, Product design VP @ Facebook

3. HopeLab.org